Soprano Erin Morley as Pamina. (Met Opera photo)
Without flying to New York, Manila opera lovers had an intimate glimpse of a Met opening night Tuesday (July 11) at Cinema 1. Greenbelt 3 in the screening of a new production of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte (Magic Flute) directed by Simon McBurney.
Baritone Thomas Oliemans as Papageno was endearing, the Pamina of Erin Morley has ample vocal appeal, and the Tamino of Lawrence Brownlee offered more solid vocal output than physical appeal.
Filipinos who have sung Tamino in various productions include tenors Noel Velasco (CCP 1982), Arthur Espiritu (various productions in Germany and Israel), and Nomher Nival at St. Scholastica’s College Auditorium in 2019.
“We hope that this regular screening of live operas at the Met will bring in more audiences for this art form,” CCP president Margie Moran Floirendo said before the screening. “It is really the least expensive way to enjoy first-rate production of operas without having to travel to New York.”
CCP vice president and artistic director Dennis Marasigan announced the opera line-up in the series and introduced soprano Em Alcantara who sang Pamina’s aria and the Queen of the Night favorite before the screening.
Also present in the screening was Dr. Jaime Laya, head of the Filipinas Opera Society Foundation, Inc.
As for the film of the opera production, Greenbelt audiences saw not just the complete opera but also one-on-one interviews with lead singers, the director and conductor during the intermission. They provided good production insights into the staging of the opera.
The Met’s latest Magic Flute staging had the orchestra and special effects artists sharing the stage with the singers.
Costumes for the ensembles must have looked bizarre for conservative opera lovers. The women wore combat boots and strange fur coats.
In the film, you can see special effects person Ruth Sullivan on stage left, showing audiences how sounds are made true to life.
If the Three Ladies in the 1982 CCP staging of Magic Flute bordered on the demure, this Met production has three oversized ladies (Alexandria Shiner, Olivia Vote, Tamara Mumford) lusting after Tamino’s body. They strip Tamino down to his underwear and manage to do sensual sniffing which had the audiences laughing with amusement.
Thomas Oliemans is an adorable Papageno, but the Sarastro of Stephen Milling with his solid bass takes the cake, so to speak.
As expected, the Queen of the Night aria of soprano Kathryn Lewek was the scene-stealer. When she emerged at curtain call, the Met audiences just stood up for a well-deserved standing ovation, leaving the soprano teary-eyed.
In this unusual staging, orchestra flutist Seth Morris gave the audience a taste of the magic flute—the real sound. Bryan Wagorn demonstrated how the keyboard glockenspiel work for the character of Papageno.
The final closing chorus (Schönheit und Weisheit) of the ensemble was almost hair-raising (at least to this opera lover). It brought back memories of the magical CCP nights at the opera in 1982.
Nathalie Stutzmann conducted not just with authority but with love. Not surprising. She was a singer (a French contralto) before she turned to conducting.
Lucrecia Kasilag revealed the CCP’s best-kept opera-production figure.—a ‘hefty $250,000’ (roughly more than P13 million today) was paid Sarah Caldwell of the Boston Opera to produce the English version of Mozart’s Magic Flute
About the 1982 Magic Flute at the CCP, a chapter in the autobiography of National Artist for Music Lucrecia Kasilag revealed the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ best-kept opera-production figure. The then CCP president, who became National Artist for Music, revealed a “hefty $250,000 (roughly more than P13 million today) was paid Sarah Caldwell of the Boston Opera to produce the English version of Mozart’s Magic Flute.
Sarah Caldwell, PPO conductor of the 1982 CCP ‘Magic Flute’ with the author in 1981:
The CCP then had a cultural tie-up with the Opera Company of Boston headed by the eminent Caldwell hailed as “one of America’s best known and most adventurous conductors and opera directors.”
Reasoned out Caldwell to this writer in 1981 at the height of the Magic Flute controversy: “I don’t think we have to apologize for the economic problems of the entire world and the fact that they affect us. This (opera) company will stay alive, and I am very proud of the cast that we have been able to assemble. The pressure to present the great stars is always there, but, generally, by the time they become great stars, they can’t sing anymore anyway. You will hear that there are not that many Sarah Reeses and Noel Velascos that come along; we are going to make our own stars and that will be fun.”
In the 1982 CCP Magic Flute, Noel Velasco was Tamino, Gamaliel Viray was Papageno alternating with Robert Orth, and Lilia Reyes and Jovita Castro alternating as Pamina.
The 1982 Pamina in ‘Magic Flute’—Lilia Reyes—at CCP signing autograph backstage; ‘Every country should strive to bring music to all people’
Caldwell who led the PPO in 1982 is described by Time magazine as America’s “Music’s Wonder Woman,” and the first woman conductor to be seen at the Metropolitan Opera starring her best friend, soprano Beverly Sills who sang at the Meralco Theater in 1989. She is the subject of two memoirs: Challenges: A Memoir of My Life in Opera, by Caldwell with Rebecca Matlock (Wesleyan University Press, 2008); and Sarah Caldwell: The First Woman of Opera by Daniel Kessler (Scarecrow Press, 2008).
One will remember Caldwell as opera’s tireless warrior during that Manila encounter of 1981. I remember what she said to me: “Every country should strive to bring music to all people regardless of social backgrounds. And, by saying that, one does not say that opera is any less precious or any less special. It just means that our people are entitled to experience the precious special things in life.”
Magic Flute was also staged in 2019 at the St. Scholastica’s College with Camille Lopez Molina as director and with the following cast: Myramae Meneses as Pamina, Lorenz Lapresca; Nomher Nival as Tamino, Kevin Chan as Papagueno, Roxy Aldiosa, Bernaduette Mamauag and Mavel Bautista as Queen of the Night, Roby Malubay as Sarastro and Carlo S. Mañalac as Monostatos, among others.
Myra Meneses, the Pamina of the 2019 Magic Flute directed by Camille Lopez Molina.
Baritone Hakan Hagegard, the Papageno in the 1975 Ingmar Bergman film version of Magic Flute was heard in a CCP concert in the late ’70s.
The opera line-up in the CCP-Met HD series includes Don Giovanni on August 1, Verdi’s Falstaff on September 5, Umberto Giordano’s Fedora on October 3, Engelbert Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel November 7 and Cosi Fan Tutte on December 5.
Now on its 8th season, the CCP’s The Met: Live in HD series is a special program of the CCP Film, Broadcast, and New Media Division in partnership with The Metropolitan Opera of New York, the Filipinas Opera Society Foundation, Inc., and Ayala Malls Cinemas.
Students and young professionals may enjoy the screenings at PHP100 upon presentation of valid ID. Tickets are available at Greenbelt ticket booths and the website http://www.sureseats.com.
